How to Tell a Sociopath from a Psychopath

Many forensic psychologists, psychiatrists and criminologists use the terms sociopathy and psychopathy interchangeably. Leading experts disagree on whether there are meaningful differences between the two conditions. I contend that there are clear and significant distinctions between them.

The fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), released by the American Psychiatric Association in 2013, lists both sociopathy and psychopathy under the heading of Antisocial Personality Disorders (ASPD). These disorders share many common behavioral traits which lead to the confusion between them. Key traits that sociopaths and psychopaths share include:

A disregard for laws and social mores

A disregard for the rights of others

A failure to feel remorse or guilt

A tendency to display violent behavior

In addition to their commonalities, sociopaths and psychopaths also have their own unique behavioral characteristics, as well.

Sociopaths tend to be nervous and easily agitated. They are volatile and prone to emotional outbursts, including fits of rage. They are likely to be uneducated and live on the fringes of society, unable to hold down a steady job or stay in one place for very long. It is difficult but not impossible for sociopaths to form attachments with others. Many sociopaths are able to form an attachment to a particular individual or group, although they have no regard for society in general or its rules. In the eyes of others, sociopaths will appear to be very disturbed. Any crimes committed by a sociopath, including murder, will tend to be haphazard, disorganized and spontaneous rather than planned.

Psychopaths, on the other hand, are unable to form emotional attachments or feel real empathy with others, although they often have disarming or even charming personalities. Psychopaths are very manipulative and can easily gain people’s trust. They learn to mimic emotions, despite their inability to actually feel them, and will appear normal to unsuspecting people. Psychopaths are often well educated and hold steady jobs. Some are so good at manipulation and mimicry that they have families and other long-term relationships without those around them ever suspecting their true nature.

When committing crimes, psychopaths carefully plan out every detail in advance and often have contingency plans in place. Unlike their sociopathic counterparts, psychopathic criminals are cool, calm, and meticulous. Their crimes, whether violent or non-violent, will be highly organized and generally offer few clues for authorities to pursue. Intelligent psychopaths make excellent white-collar criminals and "con artists" due to their calm and charismatic natures.

The cause of psychopathy is different than the cause of sociopathy (1). It is believed that psychopathy is the result of “nature” (genetics) while sociopathy is the result of “nurture” (environment). Psychopathy is related to a physiological defect that results in the underdevelopment of the part of the brain responsible for impulse control and emotions. Sociopathy, on the other hand, is more likely the product of childhoodtrauma and physical/emotional abuse. Because sociopathy appears to be learned rather than innate, sociopaths are capable of empathy in certain limited circumstances but not in others, and with a few individuals but not others.

Psychopathy is the most dangerous of all antisocial personality disorders because of the way psychopaths dissociate emotionally from their actions, regardless of how terrible those actions may be. Many prolific and notorious serial killers, including the late Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy, and Dennis Rader ("Bind, Torture, Kill" or BTK) are unremorseful psychopaths. Psychopathic killers view their innocent victims as inhuman objects to be tormented and violated for their amusement.

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Excellent question. Both sociopaths and psychopaths can exhibit emotional outbursts but the underlying cause is different for each. Psychopaths do so out of mimicry (believing it to be appropriate) while sociopaths do so from a lack of control. Hope that helps.

So basically psychopaths deceive people and show them a side of their personality that does not actually exist, right?

Therefore, they are like actors who play a role, and they play it so well and make it look so genuine that people believe them. So that makes psychopathy the most dangerous of all antisocial personality disorders. Did I get that right?

I'm a bit confused here. you say in your comment that psychopaths have a tendency towards violence, and some sources tend to suggest the same. Others however, including Robert Hare in his book "without conscience" says that only a very small percentage of psychopaths are actually violent..
Not too sure what to think at this stage..
could it be that Dr Hare's findings may be somewhat dated, or is it something else?
One thing for sure is that there are lots of contradictions in this field...

Seems like quite a biased statement that you made.
Though I'm sure we can find psychopaths in government, it seems just as likely To find them incorporate America – As a matter of fact, there have been some studies that have demonstrated so – especially if the culture is one where to promote oneself you have to get over on another. In such environments, the percentage of psychopaths increases as you go up the peer amid of power!
So psychopathy may be more likely In corporate America than government, since some government people are doing so due to a desire to serve society. (Psychopaths only serve themselves)
Of course, you'd get no argument from me that since multimillionaires and billionaires started the meme during Reagan's administration that all government is bad, there has been a notable uptick in the amount of government people that also only serve their own interests!

Sociopaths have true emotional outburts because they can actually feel. psychopaths have the outbursts in order to manipulate and control others. Its actually sad that the one that actually has some feeling left in them is the one that fails harder at life.

The emotional rollercoaster ride of a sociopath is often a hindrance to himself while a Psychopaths driven uncaring personality causes pain to others for they are the ultimate social chameleons but what is really sad is that most people lack empathy and fail to see the charade for what it is.....

Actually empathy is the hook a psychopath uses to connect with a gullible and naive person. If you have been hooked too many times you learn to temper your empathy and look for the red flags. There seems to be a continuum of manifestation of these traits and if you consider how we are hard wired and socialized it makes sense that it is a very messy diagnosis, however there are extreme and clear cut cases. I also look at genetic variation and social influences; you will have a certain percentage of the population that are this way because survival of the species is enhanced by this trait in situations of war and conflict. Deceitful murderous people excel in war. Success in war and conflict promote a social groups survival. (To a degree, there is also a limit to this strategy; cooperation verses competition strategies are also relevant) In general, the survival of the species benefits by having a gene pool with a variation of behavioral tendencies given changing environments. Maybe when we make progress with our social aggression the genetic expression of psychopaths and sociopaths will not be so prevalent. I look in the news this week though and see it is. Maybe when it gets bad enough we will address it.

As a psychopath I can actually admit that we do have feelings, we just don't feel them as often. It's just we don't feel them for other people. We feel sorry for only ourselves. When we are bullied to the point of depression, we pity ourselves, yet, with psychopaths being hypocrites at times, we will not hesitate from bullying others. That's just an example, the easiest one I could think of, really.

Also, would you all please stop stereotyping psychopaths? We do have feelings at times.
You only refuse to believe it.

True: psychopaths only care about their own feelings. They can feel very, very sorry for their own self when they get caught, and not feel sorry at all (aka, experience zero remorse) for the wrong they've done or the damage they've inflicted on others.
Psychopaths actually feel entitled to do what they want, when they want to, and will do whatever it takes to get what they want; they don't care about rules and laws; psychopaths feel that they're superior beings and that rules and laws and ethics are only for the lesser creatures, the empaths or neurotypicals; they think of us as sheep, or peasants.

Instead of compassion, a psychopath is more likely to actually relish the pain and fear of others and think another's distress is amusing or sexually stimulating, instead of feeling the desire to comfort someone who is hurting or terrified; that is usually referred to as "sadism." (There is at least one study showing that the pupils of psychopaths dilate with arousal when shown images of other people in pain, being beaten up, raped, tortured, etc.)

That lack of concern for the needs and feelings of others is referred to as having a "lack of empathy"; its one of the diagnostic traits of psychopathy, narcissistic pd and antisocial pd. That's not stereotyping, unless you consider diagnostic categories in general to be stereotyping.

If confronted by witnesses providing hard evidence of the reprehensible acts they've committed and the harm they've done, a psychopath's most likely response is, "...So what? Big deal. Get over it," or "I was just following orders."

No you are generalizing when saying,
"Instead of compassion, a psychopath is more likely to actually relish the pain and fear of others and think another's distress is amusing or sexually stimulating, instead of feeling the desire to comfort someone who is hurting or terrified; that is usually referred to as "sadism." (There is at least one study showing that the pupils of psychopaths dilate with arousal when shown images of other people in pain, being beaten up, raped, tortured, etc.)"

This is just generalizing psychopaths. Most Psychopaths will not feel sadism. What you are describing are those who have most likely felt this arousal due to nurture elements and not nature. A high functioning psychopath without a traumatic past might even experience horror or disinterest in the deeds being done. Sadism can exist among normal people without any ASPD at all.

I disagree, its not an overgeneralization. Psychopaths do the things they do: lie, cheat, manipulate, steal, etc., because they enjoy it and feel entitled to engage in such activities. Its all just a game to them, and they like to win.

They like hurting other people, even if its just being insulting or derogatory, or cheating/manipulating/conning someone. They like getting away with doing bad things; its called "duping delight" and it reinforces to the psychopath that they're "superior" when they get away with their atrocious behaviors.

"Sadism" is enjoying the pain or distress of others, not necessarily physical pain, or sexual pain, but emotional pain as well.

Sadism and Psychopath do not go hand in hand, it is true many are very successful and have no interest in violence at all, may as above person stated be repelled. Many simply prefer to manipulate, to play and ultimately destroy a person for amusement or gain so I have to disagree with this generalisation. Interesting how those who are not psychopaths try to claim they know so much when in reality they know so very little, scratched the proverbial surface perhaps

It seems like there is some confusion in terms. Some people use "ASPD", "sociopath" and "psychopath", interchangeably. Generally, sociopathy and psychopathy are seen as more specific kinds of antisocial personality disorder.

The author is saying that the terms should not be used interchangeably and suggesting that distinctions be drawn: that "sociopath" should be reserved for (presumably) antisocials who additionally meet the criteria x, y and z; and "psychopath" for antisocials additionally meet the criteria a, b and c. In this context, when they say a psychopath exhibits some trait, that doesn't mean that all antisocials do, just that the author wants the ones who do to be labeled "psychopath" and not the ones who don't. If you do meet the criteria, then you would not be a psychopath by that definition.

According to the criteria in DSM 35 different basic kinds of ASPD (different combinations of 3 the 7 diagnostic features) and many more (when combinations of 4-7 features are included). None of these types are necessarily unfeeling or sadistic (the only thing they would necessarily have in common would be a history of antisocial behavior starting before adulthood, and continuing to exhibit at least a handful of traits that are considered "antisocial".

"Psychopath" is typically reserved for an antisocial, habitual criminal with little chance of rehabilitation. It seems the author would include individuals who are not necessarily criminal (closet psychopaths -- because that's scientific at all). But, if they are not criminal, then it is not clear why the author would give them a stigmatizing label.

Personally, I think it is terribly misguided to try to draw new distinctions among terminology that is already confused and have various definitions already. It would be better to abandoned the old terminology and distinguish between, for example "General Antisocial" vs "Neurotic(?) Antisocial" vs "Non-Empathic(?) Antisocial". Of course, whatever ones theories of the difference and diagnosis could be reflected explicitly in the label instead of pretending that the favored theory is already captured by the existing terminological mess.

Two different people coined "sociopath" and "psychopath" for two different reasons. There is absolutely no reason to assume that there are only two relevant categories.

Do you expect people to feel sorry for you? Maybe we should advocate for the rights and feelings of the psychopath? Stand up for the rights and feelings of the psychopath although you don't care about the rights and feelings of others. Stop trying to manipulate sympathy which is a proven tactic of the psychopath and sociopath. Get some help and only then might I feel a bit more compassion.

we do that feeling is there just limited to certain individuals the rest we could give two shits about.my feeling are limited to three people.,to be honest and shoot some asshole and not feel nothing the only thing i would wotty about is getting caught

I think you are talking about someone who is on the road to being a Sociopath caused through abuse. As Psychopaths we don't feel depression normally but just may feel down for a few hours or a day or two. I don't know its possible to bully a Psychopath, even as a child we will give push back big time to someone who is attempting to bully us. Vandalism, pay someone to beat them up - drugging them, attack them even murder (at its most extreme) its all within our range. But submit to bullying? no never! we will go to our death first.

Normally we don't show emotion because its counter-productive. But sometimes when enraged or threatened we can explode into a Psychopathic Rage. We can also do this in private to let out the anger where no one will see which could be counter-productive.

The rage in public is born from frustration = annoyance = anger, or instantaneously in an emergency situation. It can have a positive instrumental outcome in the form of creating fear and hence controlling people.

It does not add up. Psychopaths and sociopaths are considered to be the same thing, the term sociopath was assigned to emphasize the damage psychopaths do to society.

Saying that psychopathy has a genetic nature, while sociopathy has a "nurture" basis is quite a bold statement. Behavior across higher vertebrates is known to have a genetic and environmental component.

From what I read here and in Psych Central, the distinction between both seems to be more semantic than real. Any person can have an outburst. So a psychopath that goes bananas every once in a while is a sociopath, and a sociopath who goes on medication to control his temper tantrums is a psychopath.

In my opinion the only difference among both types is that in popular culture psychopaths cut people in half with a chainsaw and sociopaths become the CEO of the Umbrella Corportation.

I think there are some flaws in this approach, but logic is not one of them.

The author is not giving a theory for why some people are sociopaths and some are psychopaths. There's also Antisocial, which is more general.

He's saying that he wants to use the term sociopath for antisocials who additionally meet certain criteria and psychopath for antisocials who meet a different set of additional criteria.

This is how diagnostic labels are defined. Currently sociopath and psychopath are not defined in psychology outside of being (kinds of) antisocial personality disorder.

The difference he's talking about is similar to anxiety disorders. One can have panic disorder simply because the person is predisposed to it, or have panic attacks because of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder cause by specific life circumstances. There is a genetic component even to this; only certain people exposed the same trauma develop PTSD, but there still differences in treatment protocols from panic disorder unrelated to trauma...

That said, I do not know why he is making a distinction here. Psychopath is defined in the justice system because qualifying as a psychopath is correlated with greatly increased chances of repeating crime and poor rehabilitation.

The author seems to be drawing distinctions from antisocial only to be able to have a label for bullyish CEOs. But if they are only unsavory people, not actual criminals and not suffering from a pathology that is interfering with their life, then a psychologist has no business pathologizing and stigmatizing them. It seems that there is some normal human variation and successful "psychopaths" don't suffer, indeed benefit from decreased empathy.

It's very strange to talk about a DSM diagnostic category in this case. It would be like coming up with a diagnosis for conservative or liberal...

Of course there's also the issue that this only compounds confusion. If the author wants to propose new diagnostic categories, he should use new labels, like antisocial vs neurotic antisocial vs non-empathic antisocial. Maybe he will find that there are more kinds or realize that he's on a wild goose chase because two different people happened to proposed two different terms for different things for different reasons.

agreed...I try to put Sociopaths and Psychopaths into choices or actions decided upon as opposed to "genetic defect or illness"

(that was very sociopathic of him/her to throw a tantrum/fit in class today {it was 'uncalled for, dramatic, and/or volatile}

saying things like. "they feel no remorse," makes me feel that people are giving power to sociopathic or psychopathic people who will justify their behavior in order to cut corners around proper decision making skills. All children know right from wrong.

Just to say there was a study performed in Amsterdam in 2013 in which a group of both psychopathic criminals and non-psychopathic criminals are both shown short video's of people experiencing different trauma's or pain whilst the brain is being monitored for activity. It showed that empathy works like a mirror receptor in the brain 'you mirror the effect of what you observe' for most people and (the non-psychopathic criminal) the reaction is involuntary, you instinctively empathize, the psychopath however displayed the ability to control their "empathy mirrors" when asked to empathize they could but most would choose not to. This study disproved the age old theory that they can not empathize and are lacking in basic emotion.
what you have referred to here as a "sociopath" is actually the new classification of (ASPD) as before it was seen as a mild off-branch of psychopathy it is now being distinguished as it's own disorder much like Sadistic personality disorder which has also been lumped in as a trait of psychopathy or narcissistic personality disorder in previous issues of the psychiatric journal, though new studies have proven this not to be the case.

Just to say there was A study performed in Amsterdam in 2013 in which a group of both psychopathic criminals and non-psychopathic criminals are both shown short video's of people experiencing different trauma's or pain whilst the brain is being monitored for activity. It showed that empathy works like a mirror receptor in the brain 'you mirror the effect of what you observe' for most people and (the non-psychopathic criminal) the reaction is involuntary, you instinctively empathize, the psychopath however displayed the ability to control their "empathy mirrors" when asked to empathize they could but most would choose not to. This study disproved the age old theory that they can not empathize and are lacking in basic emotion.
what you have referred to here as a "sociopath" is actually the new classification of (ASPD) as before it was seen as a generalization of personality types e.g psycho/sociopathy, it is now being distinguished as it's own disorder much like Sadistic personality disorder which has also been lumped in as a trait of psychopathy or narcissistic personality disorder in previous issues of the psychiatric journal, though new studies have proven this not to be the case.

Hey let me start be saying I'm not a psychotherapist (I'm in graduate school about to get my degree in clinical psychology though) :) the difference between alexithymia and psychopathy is the confusion factor. Someone with the former condition does have emotional responses, but has a hard time distinguishing between very similar emotions. Like fear and rage, for instance. They feel emotional arousal but are not able to specifically label emotions as such. The difference, (though flawed) can be thought of in this way: someone who is confused and questioning sexual orientation versus someone who is asexual

Sociopathy and psychopathy are separate disorders but there is significant overlap between them in terms of traits, which leads to the confusion. Generally speaking, a person will be categorized as one or the other. Thanks for asking.

You don't mention that psychopaths also have a need for power and control over others. Do you not agree with this or did you simply forget to mention it? Also, is there any known correlation between psychopaths and those who would commit child sex crimes or sex crimes in general?

Although some psychopaths do have a need for power, domination and control of others, it is not a general characteristic of the disorder. And, yes, there is a correlation between psychopathy and sexual sadism and assault. Thank you for asking.

Do you agree that sex crimes aren't about sex at all but rather having power and control over others? So if there is a proven correlation between psychopathy and sexual assault, doesn't that also prove that there exists a need for power and control in the psychopath's mental make-up? Thank you.

Actually, no, you are confusing correlation with causality. It is true that some psychopaths crave power and control and it is also true that some (a small minority) become sexual deviants. This does not mean that either phenomenon is a common trait of psychopaths, however, as is lack of empathy, for example.

Are you sure? from my experience the purpose of the deceit is just this...a need for a familiar unchanging emotional response from their interactions that justifies a selfish end. however subtle that need for control is there...
Although they do appear to have ranking systems based on aggressiveness where psychopathic groups will ddefer to a consistent unchanging leader so i suppose you have a point- but their need to control their victims? nthis is not in doubt is it?
it confirms their source of adulation and supply.

As a sociopath navigating the empathsphere is difficult, lacking empathy is a form of blindness-human emotions are alien to me and mean nothing-it is hard to care about something which is nothing but a fiction. The distinction between psychopath and sociopath seems moot-if it added to a means whereby society could channel and focus such individuals it would strike me as a valid debate.

I've always found it hard to understand that distinction too. I think it's because I consider myself having traits from both disorders. I mean, I understand the two different definitions given to them, but I don't know if I could ever be categorized as either or.